If Only
by HR always live on
Summary: What should have happened at the end of Noughts and Crosses in my opinion. Please read and review! xxx
1. Chapter 1

_Noughts and Crosses is my favourite books of all time. This fan fiction starts at the end of it and goes on from there. It's my first OX fanfiction so be kind!_

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><p>Sephy, One<p>

I looked around. Oh my God, they were really going to do it. They were going to murder him. I watched as Callum walked into the courtyard and felt the fear grab every part of me. I stopped watching him and I tried to find my father in the crowd. I would do anything on earth to stop Callum from dying. Anything at all. I would beg and plead on bended knee. If only I could see him.

There! I had him in my eye line and he wasn't too far away. I rushed through the crowd as fast as I could begging my feet to move faster. I was halfway there but Callum already had walked up the steps on the gallows. Was I going to make it? I had to make it. There simply wasn't another option. Time ticked by so slowly she could feel every beat of her heart. She made it. Her father was surrounded by very important politicians and officials. He caught her eye with surprise.

"I don't believe you have authority to be here," he said coldly. I ignored the callousness of this and stole a quick glance at Callum. He had the hood on his head. I moved closer to my father so he would be the only one to hear.

"I will do anything you want if you make this stop. Keep him alive and I'll have an abortion. I will do anything." He looked at me considering for a moment.

"How do I know you will keep your word?" he asked politely.

"Because this is torturing me and I will do anything to make it stop. Please." Kamal Hadley got his mobile phone out of his pocket and speed dialled a number I couldn't see.

"Yes, the eleventh hour came through. Thank you." Kamal Hadley put the phone back and I stared with bated breath at the gallows. He was stood on the trap door. There wasn't any time left. And then someone came running out onto the courtyard yelling.

"Stop!" Everyone looked at the voice including Callum still with his head covered in the hood. "I have high authority to stop this execution with all haste. It is to be postponed until a later date." Yells were thrown up everywhere. I looked at my father.

"If you don't follow through on your promise, all you will have done is delay the inevitable. I'll be waiting." Kamal Hadley got up swiftly and left the building, leaving me on my knees, crying with temporary relief.

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><p><em>I have the first four or five chapters written so I'll update soon. Make my day and leave a review. The more reviews I get, the quicker I'll upload the next chapter. xxx<br>_


	2. Chapter 2

Callum, Two.

At the very least I have several more hours of life. That thought was the one that kept pounding through my head. Every few moments were a few more seconds I could claim to be alive. I had been thrown back into my cell less than five minutes after standing for my death. No one had answered any questions. I don't think anyone has a clue what's going on. When the reality of what had happened set in questions exploded in my head. How did that happen? Why had my death been postponed not cancelled? Why postponed at all?

An hour later Jack returned on guard duty. "Do you know what happened?" I asked desperately.

"No. Orders from way up to stop immediately. No explanation or anything."

"Way up." That must mean Kamal Hadley. But why? "Oh! Jack?"

"Yes?"

"Don't deliver that letter to Persephone now. Its irrelevant."

"You haven't been given a pardon mate. Your death has only been postponed."

I took a deep breath. "I know. When I do die, then you can deliver it. Otherwise forget it."

"Will do." Jack paced in front of my cell. "Callum? Give it a few hours to come to terms with not being dead yet. Okay?" I nodded. That sounded like a very good idea.

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><p><em>Just a short little update. 3 coming soon...<em>


	3. Chapter 3

Sephy, Three

I was lying on my bed in my tiny flat, curled around my stomach. Curled around our baby. Which I had just agreed to sacrifice to keep Callum alive. I hated myself. I needed to see him but I doubted I'd be allowed. My hand kept rubbing my stomach of its own volition. All I wanted to do was stare into space and wait for the bomb to hit. It wouldn't take long, I knew.

Sure enough the buzz of the doorbell came a few minutes later. Slowly I got up and pushed the button to let them in. I didn't even wait to hear who was at my door. There wasn't any point. I sat and waited.

It was mother. She took a contemptuous look around what my life had shrunk down to. "What happened today?" I sighed and told her the readers digest version.

"Do you want an abortion," mother asked calmly.

"No," I said without pausing to think. "I can't even begin to comprehend Callum's death though. What I really want is to see him and tell him that I love him. But I've tried and father has ordered him to have no visitors. So here I stand." Mother looked as if this was what she had expected. She sat down on a wooden chair in what passed for my kitchen and sighed.

"I have an idea that might just work." I looked up hardly daring to believe my ears. "First, you have to move back home,"

"No, that's not happening. You haven't lifted a finger to save him. Probably worried you'd chip a nail."

"That isn't fair Sephy." She said that so quietly that I felt a little bad in spite of myself.

"Are you still drinking?" I looked very carefully at her. I needed to know before I could ever begin to trust her again.

"Not a drop since the day you moved out." After a long moment I believed her.

"What's your master plan then?" I didn't mean to sound snide but that was how it came out. "Sorry, I meant what's your idea?"


	4. Chapter 4

_I know I'm being slow in updating but I accidentally kicked a hole in my laptop and my replacement has just arrived. Here's four..._

Callum, four

Yesterday I got relocated from death row and I was now housed with the regular prisoners. I wasn't entirely sure whether that was a step up or down in the prison hierarchy. I suppose it was good in that my death didn't look to be imminent. I felt grateful for every single hour. It was more than I had expected to ever have. My cellmate was a forty year old Nought imprisoned for robbery. Matthew. For the most part I ignored him and he followed suit.

After several days I had got used to the new routine in the permanent wing of the prison. Mondays and Thursdays were visiting days. No one could talk about anything else on those days. Before the forty five minute visits everyone talked about who they hoped would come and after they kept discussing what their kids had done and so on. I tried to block it out because there was never anyone there to see me. I knew mum would want to come but I had a feeling this was to remind me that I should already be dead. I wasn't allowed any visitors.

We were allowed out into other areas of the prison during the day. There was one television and the fight over the remote took precedence most days. There was a small gym and a kitchen as well. I tried to keep my head down most of the time. I had gained notoriety which didn't make me keen to stand out. I got a few more glances than I would like so I kept to myself.

It had been a week since the day I had been due to die when I saw it. I had sat down on a chair at the back. By consensus it had been decided that they watched the news headlines and then turned over to whatever football match was playing. One of the later items caught his attention. "…Hadley's daughter seems to have confirmed reports that she is pregnant and that this is the result of her ordeal from her kidnapping a few months ago."

I suddenly felt like I was standing in an incredible bright spotlight. Everyone was looking at me, not that I could really blame them. They were about to turn over as they did every night but the man with the remote stopped and looked right at me. He waited until the rest of the news article came on. I could feel everyone's eyes boring into me but I could only watch the T.V.

Soon enough a video clip came on. It was Sephy. She had dark glasses on and was walking through a frenzy of media cameras and microphones. Jasmine Hadley had a firm grip on Sephy's arm. She was wearing a figure hugging grey dress. It was painfully obvious that she was pregnant. The news reporters voice came over the images of Sephy going into a building.

"Persephone and her mother Jasmine Hadley were walking into an abortion clinic this afternoon. It seems almost certain that this pregnancy is the result of her terrible ordeal when she was kidnapped by nought terrorists. She…" I didn't wait to hear anymore. I walked back into my cell and I was stopped by no one. That was it then. She had had an abortion. Our baby… didn't exist anymore.

I lied down on the bed and stared at the bunk bed above me, my head in my hands. I needed to know so badly what she was thinking. Why she had an abortion? Why? Did she regret everything that had happened between us? The cell door opened and Matthew walked in. I didn't move an inch. I really had nothing to say to anyone at all.

"Don't…"

"Shut up," I said straight away. "Anything you have to say, I really don't need to hear it." Matthew nodded and walked back out. I sighed. My thoughts were screaming out one word. Why?


	5. Chapter 5

Sephy, five

Mother looked out of the window from inside my room in the clinic. "They're going away now." I got up from the bed and peered through the window. She was right. The last reporters were packing up their things and going home. Thank God. That was incredibly hard to do.

"What am I going to do if Callum sees those pictures?" I asked my mother, laying back down on the bed.

"At least you now have that problem," mother said acidly.

"Do you think he'll buy it?" Mother sighed. She knew what I was asking.

"You better hope so."

"Why are you doing this for me?" I asked. "Or for us." I ran a hand over my stomach. The baby had suddenly given a small kick. I sat up quickly and pressed a hand to my stomach. I smiled to myself. Mine and Callum's baby was moving. I smiled. How could I ever have thought of having an abortion? Mother sat down on the bottom of the bed staring at me. She threw a mobile phone at me and I caught it, bewildered.

"Call your father and see if he saw it."

"Wouldn't I still be knocked out? Because of the drugs I'm meant to have taken." Mother looked at her watch.

"You'd probably be coming around about now. Give him a ring." I took a deep breath. "You need to do this Sephy."

I looked at the phone. "I know." I dialled before I could bottle out.

"Kamal Hadley," came the response.

"Hi, dad," I said in a small voice. I was trying to come across all contrite so he would believe me. God knows what would happen to Callum if he didn't believe me.

"Hello Sephy," he said in a kind voice I hadn't heard from him since childhood. "How are you feeling." He knew. To say that he must know.

"I'm a little tired," I said, playing up to him. "I've just come around." That was a downright lie but she didn't care.

"Ah, I'm pleased you saw sense." I fought the wave of rage that flared up at that.

"I'm moving back in with mother," I said. Unfortunately that was true. I wasn't exactly looking forward to it but over the past few days mother hadn't drunk anything more alcoholic than orange juice. She had kept her word so I had to keep mine.

"That's wonderful, sweetie. I am so glad." He sounded relieved to her. He clearly thought that she would back out. With reason, I thought pleased.

"Dad, you said if I had an abortion that… that Callum's sentence…" I tailed off holding my breath.

"I'll keep my word darling," he said much unhappier. "It will be reduced to a ten year sentence."

"Thank you daddy," I said relieved. "Can I come and see you to say thanks in person?" I knew that suggesting this would be perfect cover. If I was still pregnant I would never see him. That was crystal clear. I hoped desperately that the answer would be no. I was counting on a politicians busy schedule.

"Um… I don't think that's a good idea. I am very busy for the next month." Thank God.

"Well. Thank you."

"Well done for doing the right thing, Sephy. Love you." The ring tone came very quickly. I took a breath and looked at my mother.

"I think he believed me." I lent against the pillows on the bed with my eyes shut. "He's commuted Callum's sentence to ten years. He'll be out of prison by the time he's twenty nine."

"Well done." Mother sat next to me and brushed my hair out of my eyes. "Do you want to sleep here or go home?"

"Home," I said immediately. I had no desire to stay here. The place that could kill my baby. I stood up. "Can you help me get my stomach wrapped up?"

We had decided that was the best way to do it. We had brought in a long strip of cloth to wrap it tightly around my pregnant stomach to make it smaller. It wouldn't make it vanish but it would make it small enough to be able to be passable.

"Keep going," I said breathlessly. We had to make it as tight as possible but it was slightly hard to breathe. The end of the strip came and mother pinned the end up with a couple of safety pins.

"How is that?"

"I can barely breathe so its great." I pulled my T-shirt over my bump. You could still see it but I put on my coat as well. It had a belt just under my bust so the coat skimmed my stomach. "How does that look?"

"Great," mother said. "You couldn't tell."

"Right, can you get me to a car before I pass out for lack of oxygen!"

"Are you sure you're going to be okay?" Mother looked very anxious.

"Yeah," I said breathlessly. "Just hurry up." She took a long look at me and then decided that I was alright enough to carry on.

By the time I got to the waiting car I was very breathless. The baby had kicked once or twice as if it protested to the lack of the space it was used to. Mother looked concerned but said nothing. She didn't want the driver to notice anything. He wasn't in on our secret.


	6. Chapter 6

Callum, six

The morning after I saw Sephy on the news going to the clinic the run of the mill lawyer I had been appointed had an unscheduled meeting with me. As he was a lawyer I assumed that nothing he told me could possibly be good news. I was probably halfway back to the scaffold anyway so my hopes weren't exactly high.

I sat down opposite him. He was a Cross but he didn't look too well off. In fact, he looked like he hated his job because he had a look on his face that showed me that he thought I was guilty. More than that, he looked like he thought the best place for me was at the end of a rope.

"What's the bad news then?" I asked. I wasn't in the mood for drawing it out longer than necessary.

"Your sentence has been reduced to ten years," the lawyer said in a bored voice. "You will not be on death row and you will live to see the outside of prison. You will be able to have visitors from next week. That's all."

"Really?" I said unable to believe it. "You aren't winding me up?" The Cross lawyer looked blankly at me. He probably couldn't joke if his life depended on it. The lawyer got up to leave after that short interview. I was led back to my cell by a couple of guards. As if I was going to try anything.

I now had my life back. It was incredibly hard to wrap my mind around it. I had got used to the fact of dying and it was hard to accept that one day I would be free. I would see the outside of this prison. And something that, at the moment was much more important to me. I was now allowed visitors. I could see mum. I'm sure she would have tried to visit before. I wasn't entirely sure Sephy would try to visit. I hoped she would but I wasn't going to hold my breath. Not after the abor… After that.

The first day I was allowed visitors my mum did turn up. I had to sit behind a glass barrier and speak over the phone. I felt horrible that she had to come here and speak to me through a barrier. Mum looked… old. She had lost all of her family and it looked like it had finally taken its toll on her.

"How are you mum?"

"Fine, how are you?"

"My sentence has been reduced to ten years, had you heard?"

"No I didn't know. That's great!" Mum's eyes began to fill with tears.

"Mum, this is good news. You don't have to cry."

"I know." Both of us went quiet for a while. We couldn't think of anything to say. Something struck me.

"Has Jude been caught?" Mums eyes went wide and she shook her head. "Do you know if Sephy…?"

"Don't talk to me about her," mum said harshly. "I saw her on the news getting rid of the baby. How could she do that!"

"Don't. It isn't her fault." But I wished I said nothing.

"Of course its her fault! You didn't kill the baby. She had a choice. She…" I tuned out. I didn't need to hear all the problems Sephy had and all the things that she could have prevented. It wasn't worth it. But it did hurt that Sephy hadn't even turned up to visit. She hadn't even bothered to try to explain why she had murdered our baby.

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><p><em>The next chapter is in bits and pieces so it might be a little while before I post. I'll get it up asap.<em>


	7. Chapter 7

Sephy, Seven

Mother owned the house now. Dad had given up the house so he looked dignified in defeat, at least in public. In public I looked obedient which was all he cared about. I am now nine months pregnant and I have never been more uncomfortable in my life while I am waiting to pop. I haven't seen Minnie in ages. She's off at uni and she hasn't come home in a while. I haven't spoken to her that much.

I haven't seen Callum either. I really need to go and see him but I can't go when I'm pregnant. I don't want even the possibility of it to get back to my father. That is another reason I am desperate to give birth. Once I have, I can see Callum. That thought is the one that keeps me going through these last torturous and weighty days of my pregnancy.

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><p>I collapsed onto the bed, completely exhausted, every muscle in my body on fire. I sat up on the bed slowly as I heard my daughter cry for thee first time. "Is she okay?" I asked my mother hoarsely.<p>

"She's fine," Jasmine said, wrapping the newborn in a baby blanket and handing her to me. I gently held this new life in my arms and felt terrified. Now I had a whole other life to take care of. Someone who depended on me for everything completely. A beautiful baby girl who was half mine, half Callum's. Her skin was a beautiful milky brown. Much lighter than my own dark skin. She was so beautiful and I felt a fierce rush of love for this tiny creature. She stopped crying and hiccupped lightly with her eyes closed.

When my eyes had taken in their fill for the time being, I put her down in the crib at the bottom of my bed. Luckily the birth had gone smoothly which was a relief as I hadn't had any professional help. Part of the lie to the world.

"Thought of a name for her yet?" Jasmine asked me with a small smile on her face.

"Callie Rose," I said immediately. Nothing would make me change my mind. No matter what the world thought, I knew that she had been conceived from an act of love, not violence or hatred. "And I want her to have the last name McGregor," I added. I saw a flicker of pain go over my mothers face but she didn't say anything to me, which I was grateful for.

"I need to see him mother," I said.

"I know."

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><p>I walked into the prison with my heart beating incredibly fast. I sat down looking through a clear glass barrier. Looking at Callum. He wasn't looking at me. He picked up the phone without even throwing me a glance.<p>

"I wondered if you would turn up," he said in a dead voice that scared me.

"Hi," I said quietly. "Please can you look at me." He did but I almost wished he hadn't. The things that made up my Callum seemed to have vanished. It was almost like a stranger was staring back at me.

"I saw you had an abortion," he said plainly. "Why?"

"Because my father said if I did, you wouldn't die. You'd have a ten year sentence and one day you would be free. That's why I agreed."

"You couldn't have come to talk about it with me then?"

"You weren't allowed any visitors. Believe me, I tried. I tried everyday to see you." I could see from Callum's face that he did believe that, he had known that stubborn quality in me for too long to doubt it.

"I love you Callum," I told him.

"I have spent a lot of days wishing to hear you say that. But don't lie to me," he said. "It's worse if you lie about it."

"I am not lying," I said slowly. "That night in the cabin was the best of my life. I do love you."

"I love you too," he told me. "I just can't believe you would have an abortion to save me. You shouldn't have done it."

"I didn't have an abortion," I whispered so quietly I didn't know if he could hear me. "I just made it up. I've been trapped in the house for months waiting for the baby to be born. Its why I didn't visit you when it was the thing I wanted to do most in the world."

"You've had… our baby?" he asked slowly. I nodded quickly. I hardly noticed the tracks of my tears as they fell down my face.

"It's a girl," I said, smiling while crying. "She's beautiful. I brought you something." I quickly got a small picture of Callie out of the pocket of my jeans. I didn't want anyone to see it because awkward questions might be asked. I held the picture flat against the glass so Callum could have a long look.


	8. Chapter 8

_This is only a short update. I have written more but I'm not sure where to go from here so it might be a while before my next post..._

Callum, eight.

"That's…" I couldn't speak. Sephy was showing me a picture of our baby. The one I thought didn't exist. My fingers were stroking the glass, as if I could touch our baby. Sephy took the picture away as a prison guard walked behind her. I felt robbed of something special. Something priceless.

"How?"

"It's a long story," Sephy said smiling to herself bitterly. I could see just how much the last few months must have cost her.

"What did you call her?" I said very quietly.

"Callie Rose McGregor," Sephy said proudly. "Unofficially though. She doesn't have a birth certificate."

"You don't have to call her after me," I said honestly. "And you don't have to give her my last name."

"I wanted to. It felt right."

"She's beautiful, just like her mother." Sephy said nothing. She stared at me as if she saw something so much more than what I was.

"Thank you."

"For what?" Sephy asked.

"For keeping me from hanging at the end of a rope. For keeping our baby." Sephy smiled. She glanced around surreptitiously and showed him the photograph again in the silence. He felt like he could never get bored of looking at her small sleeping face.


	9. Chapter 9

_I know its been a while since I updated. Here's a short update..._

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><p>Two years later…<p>

Sephy, nine.

I woke up feeling exhausted. Callie had hit the terrible twos and her screaming was wearing my down. I still live with mother and she has actually been a really big help with Callie Rose. In particular, babysitting her when I visit her father in prison. I went downstairs, relishing these precious moments to myself before my daughter woke up as she surely would soon.

"Good morning," I said to mother who was making coffee while listening to the radio. She was such a different person to who she had been a few years ago. Being this close to her granddaughter was what had changed her. She adored Callie and Callie loved her too. Something caught my attention and I was no longer thinking of my daughter.

"Turn that up," I said in a hollow voice. My mother was moving far too slowly so I pushed her out of the way and turned the radio up myself.

"…surprise move last night the house of commons revealed that the death penalty has been outlawed. No more executions will be carried out by the state which is a relief for many families who have relatives on death row. But not so much of a relief to their many, many victims…" I was shocked when I felt hot coffee splash all over my feet. I hadn't even realised I'd dropped her mug until the coffee soaked through mysocks. Mother turned the radio off as it became clear that I was no longer listening.

"This means…" she said.

"Yes," I replied collapsing into a kitchen chair. Callum would live. He wouldn't die in prison. He would not be murdered by what people in this country called justice. I couldn't help it. The tears ran in hot trails down my face.

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